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Posted by Aimee27 comments Published: Aug 16, 2021Last Updated: Aug 16, 2021
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It doesn’t get any easier than these 3 ingredient Peanut Butter Cookies. Whip up a batch of delicious homemade peanut butter cookies that are naturally flour-free and dairy-free!
This 3 ingredient cookies recipe will blow you away. For more peanut butter goodness, try our Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies too! Or make a batch of this No Bake Peanut Butter Lasagna for the ultimate dessert.
Why this Recipe Works
Including cooling time, these cookies will be ready to eat in under 30 minutes! I always keep the ingredients for these Peanut Butter Cookies on hand so I can make a fresh batch at a moment’s notice.
While my classic peanut butter cookie recipe is amazing, today’s cookie has value all on it’s own!
Only three ingredients.
No flourneeded.
Quick and easy.
Classic criss-cross pattern.
Amazing peanut butter flavor!
Peanut Butter Cookies. From scratch. In minutes. What could be better?
Ingredient Notes
All you need to make peanut butter cookies:
Peanut Butter. I use creamy, sweetened peanut butter. Do not use natural peanut butter. It makes cookies oily and crumbly.
Granulated sugar.
Egg.
Once you mix the ingredients together, just scoop onto a pan, bake, cool and enjoy!
Variations
Chocolate chips. Fold morsels into the dough before baking for a tasty twist.
Crunchy cookies. Fold chopped peanuts into the dough for a nutty crunch.
Flavored peanut butter. Try different flavored peanut butters to change it up. Just make sure the peanut butter is not “natural style”.
Tips & Tricks
How to make the criss cross pattern. Press the flat side of a fork onto the top of each cookie before baking. Rotate the fork 90 degrees and press again. Make sure to use gentle pressure so you don’t tear the cookie.
Do not over bake. Cookies should be lightly browned on the bottom but not dark. These cookies can go from delightfully crispy to burnt in no time so keep an eye on that timer.
Cool completely. Resist the temptation to gobble the cookies down right away. They taste best when allowed to cool to room temperature.
Add Jelly. My peanut butter and jelly cookies are made using this easy peanut butter cookie recipe!
Freeze Cookies.Use my tips onhow to freeze cookie doughfor later.
Recipe FAQs
Can I use natural peanut butter in cookies?
Natural peanut butters (the kind you have to keep in the refrigerator) do not contain any stabilizers. As a result, the oils separate from the peanuts. That’s why you have to stir natural peanut butter before using. When used in baking, the oils rise to the surface of the cookie. The result is a greasy, crumbly cookie that won’t hold together.
Why are my peanut butter cookies falling apart?
When cookies get dry and crumbly, over baking is usually the culprit. Crunchy peanut butter will also make the cookies more crumbly.
How do you store peanut butter cookies?
Store these cookies in an airtight container at room temperature for about 3 days.
Can you freeze peanut buter cookies?
Yes, peanut butter cookies keep well in the freezer for up to 3 months.
It doesn't get any easier than these 3 ingredient Peanut Butter Cookies. Whip up a batch of delicious homemade peanut butter cookies that are naturally flour-free and dairy-free!
Prep Time: 5 minutesminutes
Cook Time: 10 minutesminutes
Total Time: 15 minutesminutes
Servings: 24cookies
Ingredients
1cupcreamy peanut butter
1cupgranulated sugar
1large egg
Instructions
Preheat oven to 350 degree F. Line a cookie sheet with parchment paper.
In a mixing bowl, combine peanut butter, sugar and egg. Mix until well combined. Scoop into 1 Tbsp balls and drop onto cookie sheet.
Using the tines of a fork, flatten cookie dough with criss-cross of fork tines.
Bake for 10-12 minutes, until lightly browned. Allow to cool completely.
Notes
I do not recommend natural peanut butter in this recipe, as it can be too oily.
Mix-ins: add some chocolate chips for a tasty twist.
Indulge in the simplest yet most satisfying treat with these 3-Ingredient Peanut Butter Cookies. Made with just peanut butter, sugar, and an egg, these cookies are a breeze to whip up, requiring minimal effort and time (under 30 minutes!).
So it looks like that there are utilitarian reasons for the cross-hatching—to allow for even cooking—but it might have been passed along for nearly a hundred years for primarily aesthetic reasons, where the cross-hatching is more to identify the cookies as peanut butter ones, rather than to cook them well.
Kind of like how crumbly dough is usually because there's too much of the dry ingredients, runny cookie dough comes from having too much of the liquid ingredients.
Easy Add-Ins: After creating the dough according to the peanut butter cookie mix instructions, try introducing 1 cup of add-ins like REESE'S PIECES, toffee bits, dried fruits, mini marshmallows or even cooked bacon bits, if you're feeling adventurous!
Why are my cookies dry and crumbly? This is most likely a classic case of using too much flour. It's crucial to properly measure the flour in this recipe, as even 1 extra tablespoon of flour can completely change the structure of the cookies. You also might have over baked them!
If the temperature of your ingredients isn't just right, you won't get the results you want - like when your cookie dough refuses to spread out evenly on the baking sheet. This could be caused by too-cold butter or eggs that haven't been brought to room temperature.
"When your dough is refrigerated, the butter hardens. So when you bake them, they spread less and hold their shape better," adds Epperson. "Which means a better likelihood of a soft, chewy cookie in the center." Chilling the dough creates fluffier cookies with better consistency.
If you don't flatten the cookies first, then the fork does double duty – it performs both functions. One very subtle result of creating the pattern is that the little tips of dough bake up crisper than the rest of the cookie, giving you both a bit of additional texture and deeper taste where the dough is more baked.
You baked your cookies and they came out an oily greasy mess. Urgh, what an awful feeling! If you've had this happen to you, odds are you made one of two mistakes: either you didn't allow the ingredients to thoroughly mix during the creaming process or you didn't allow the dough to rest enough before baking.
Butter will make your cookies taste buttery; shortening will make them taste suspiciously vacant, like Katy Perry's voice post-autotune. Yes, shortening yields chewier cookies than butter does, because butter contains water and shortening doesn't.
Dry – “Dry” or “Crumbly” dough is a product of over-mixing or using too much of any ingredient during the mixing process. This can be reversed by adding one to two tablespoons of liquid (water, milk or softened butter) to your mix.
Unlike many other cookies, peanut butter biscuits only fully harden once they've been removed from the oven. Here's how to tell when peanut butter cookies are done: The tops of the cookies are a uniform light brown.They're soft to the touch but not moist or mushy.
To make cookies from scratch, you'll typically need ingredients like flour, sugar, butter, eggs, baking powder/soda, vanilla extract, and salt. Specific recipes may include additional ingredients like chocolate chips, nuts, or oats depending on the type of cookies you want to make.
While there may be countless variations, each cookie at the core has four ingredients – butter, sugar, flour & eggs. The proportions of ingredients and the methods of mixing are what define our cookies. Dough spreads – Inside the hot oven, the butter starts to melt and the dough gradually starts to spread out.
Introduction: My name is Chrissy Homenick, I am a tender, funny, determined, tender, glorious, fancy, enthusiastic person who loves writing and wants to share my knowledge and understanding with you.
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